Sunday, November 6, 2016

The consensus on Rotten Tomatoes seems to be that Doctor Strange's awesome visual effects make up for a formulaic script - that the movie's cooler than it is good. I completely agree with the first half, that the movie is gorgeous and fascinating to behold. But frankly, I think critics are being too harsh on the script, which offers some incredibly satisfying twists and deviations from the typical superhero origin story.

That's not to say it's unrecognizable as a Marvel origin, nor that it doesn't have its share of familiar story beats. But that's really more a critique of Strange's creators, Steve Ditko and Stan Lee: for better or worse, there are a lot of repeated themes and concepts in 1960's Marvel heroes. Sure, Doctor Strange and Tony Stark are both arrogant geniuses who sustain life-altering injuries that lead them down a path to becoming heroes. And, yes, they've even got similar facial hair.

I don't begrudge critics - particularly those who weren't prepared for these commonalities - from maybe tuning out a bit at this point and writing the story off as generic comic book nonsense and enjoying the eye candy. But if you peer a little closer, you might notice some fairly big differences.

While Tony Stark started out as a weapons inventor, Doctor Strange was a surgeon, and both his outlook and strategies proceed from that origin. It's difficult to overstate how his distaste for violence permeates his decisions, even in combat. Simply put, he's not a fighter, even after learning the basics, and that fact alone offers a breath of fresh air.

Go in accepting that there are superficial similarities between Strange and other Marvel heroes, and you'll have an easier time catching the more nuanced shifts in this adaptation. The movie kind of fast-forwards to Doctor Strange's induction into the mystic arts, anyway, at which point it definitely stops feeling like a retread.

Even if you disagree that the writing was solid (at least for big-budget entertainment), I can't imagine not being impressed by the bells and whistles. The magic on display is well thought out, delivering the bizarre surrealism of the comics. Physics become playthings, as does spacial geometry. Forget Inception - that movie's simple games with space and time are tame in comparison.

No less importantly, Marvel has once again dramatically scaled up the scope of their universe. If I have once complaint with Doctor Strange, it's that it felt like it barely teased the richness of this new corner. I want monsters, demons, spirits... all of it. Doctor Strange was fairly limited in its depiction of the denizens of its multiverse, but it certainly feels like the doors are wide open.

I doubt many of you need convincing, but this is absolutely worth a trip to the theater.